Carnival Edge: New and Selected Poems

This collection draws work from 5 of Gallagher's previous collections, together with a substantial body of new work. Born in Australia, Gallagher moved to Paris before settling in London. She draws on a rich inheritance from these different worlds in her poetry, which is always rooted in a passionate sense of discovery and attention to place.

To be able to follow, within a single volume, the evolution and refinement of a poet of Gallagher's subtlety and integrity is a fascination in itself. At its best, this is delicate, straight talking - a poetics that yokes inner generosity to outward reticence, a guileless paredness reminiscent of outback. Coming in from the heat, it's not always clear whether these poems dance or simply walk; but with a turn of phrase, a shoe-tight image, an elegant sleight of foot, everything is transformed. Reading Gallagher, one recognises there are ways of walking that are also dance.

Mario Petrucci

Katherine Gallagher is a fervent watcher of the world. Like the watcher in her poem Orchid she is also a global traveller, and this informs all of her work. Her past, that antipodean patchwork, is also a rich resource comprising memory and discovery, a place where weather's a way of life... Landscape, war, family, the gains and losses of life, plus aerial meditations during long flights - all shine forth in the wide range of her subject matter, wrought in vivid colours. Gallagher is a poet of the eye, the rainbow and of all the feeling senses. In Manifesto, from the final section of new poems which crown this volume, she says: ... Bring out your gambler, / risk-taker. Surprise yourself. This book attests to the energy and insight of that statement.

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Quotes and Reviews

There's always something special about a New and Selected; for Katherine Gallagher this selection has a Carnival Edge, its natural territory the exotic and unknown, the fringe and carnivalesque. ...more »

Jane Holland, Poetry Review Vol.100:3, Autumn 2010

Katherine Gallagher, who has lived in London since the 1970s, has now published six books of poetry, all but two of them with British or American publishers. ...more »

Susan Lever, Dali's Lobster, Australian Book Review, September 2010

A collection to treasure, including the best of Katherine's considerable output, spanning the years from 1974 to the current day. ...more »

Anna Avebury, Ver Poets' Poetry World, Autumn 2010

One measure of a poet is the degree to which they take risks with their poetry, with its style, its diction and/or its subject matter. ...more »

The Australian Reader #72, January 2011

No fake, rosy picture of the world:
Katherine Gallagher has produced only four collections since her first in 1974 and perhaps that's one reason I hadn't heard of her before opening my review copy of Carnival Edge. ...more »

Rob A Mackenzie, magma 49, March 2011

Katherine Gallagher's Carnival Edge: New and Selected Poems draws on thirty-five years of published work and consistently manifests a love of for her native country, Australia, as well as the way her relationship with it has changed since she moved to England in 1979. ...more »

Carrie Etter The Warwick Review Vol.V No.1 March 2011

Katherine Gallagher's New and Selected Poems has been long-anticipated, but the wait has been worthwhile; Arc Publications are to be commended on this impressive volume of over 160 pages. ...more »

Penelope Shuttle, Artemis Issue 6, May 2011

The epigraph to Katherine Gallagher's collection is from the American feminst poet Nadya Aisenberg:
Still, he sees all things connected,
the body to the universe,
the same laws governing all:
what makes the planets dance,
the apple fall. ...more »

R.V. Bailey, Envoi Issue 165, July 2013

The poem 'Shapes Within a Pattern', which emphasises the importance of observation, nicely introduces Katherine Gallagher's Carnival Edge,a volume of new and selected poetry that draws on four decades of writing. ...more »